Flight Attendant`s Job Not Thrill It Appears To Be

April 17, 1988|By ARTHUR FROMMER, Syndicated Columnist

In the early years of commercial aviation, when planes flew the Atlantic three times a week, working as a flight attendant was a wonderful way to see the world. You landed in Lisbon, let`s say; repaired for a bit of rest to a grand traditional hotel; and then spent a couple of leisurely days seeing the city before flying back.

How is it now? Are those jobs aboard a plane, pushing carts of pre-packaged meals up and down the aisle, still the route to take for travel-loving Americans? Are the rewards of travel sufficient to justify what is, from common observation, an unusually arduous sort of work, consisting largely of repetitive functions?

To answer those questions, I interviewed six flight attendants from as many airlines, plus a supervisor of flight attendants at one mighty line, and the director of an information service for aspiring flight attendants. Their answers were more complex than I had anticipated.

PAYING THEIR DUES

For people seeking an immediate, constant access to the world`s great sights -- right now, without delay -- the prospects are disappointing. Rules of seniority restrict access to the better routes and schedules. For the first five or more years, until they have acquired a bit of status, most fledgling flight attendants are assigned to dull domestic itineraries, flying constantly from one industrial city to another.

Only after they have paid their dues, so to speak, are they able successfully to bid for Rome or Hong Kong, for Rio or Kathmandu.

Even when the destination is an attractive one, the rapid turnaround of jet aircraft, and the constant flow of flights, restricts the amount of time available for enjoying that city. The average domestic layover is 10 to 24 hours. You fly to Phoenix, let`s say, arrive at 10 p.m., are taken for a night`s sleep to an airport hotel, and have little more than the next morning in which to see the sights or relax at the pool before getting to the airport for a return flight.

On a long-distance, international flight, the average layover is longer, but still no more than one or two days. You leave New York on Monday evening, for instance, arrive at Paris on Tuesday morning, and fly back to New York on Wednesday afternoon. But since your outbound flight has gone throughout the night, you need to sleep for much of Tuesday in order to recover. Therefore, you have little more than late Tuesday afternoon and evening, and Wednesday morning, for enjoying Paris.

PERKS OF THE JOB

How about the chance to travel on your own time, and not simply when you`re flying for the airline? Isn`t it true that flight attendants can themselves fly free, and to almost anywhere, when they`re off duty?

The answer, generally, is yes; after working for an initial period, flight attendants receive the right to fly free (on a chancy, space available basis) on services of their own airline, and often -- using reciprocal privileges -- on the flights of another airline. That`s a considerable fringe benefit, and it extends to the spouse and dependent children of the flight attendant and (sometimes) to their parents as well.

But again, in the early years, the rules of seniority often limit the ability of a flight attendant to make off-duty use of his or her fly-for-free privileges. That`s because most flight attendants, in their first one to four years of flying, are placed on a reserve status: They are made to fly as and when the airline determines, and often on as few as four hours` notice. Although most flight attendants are guaranteed at least 12 scheduled days off each month (and some get 15), it can happen that those days (for a junior flight attendant) can be so scattered throughout the month as to leave insufficient blocs of time for anything resembling international travel. Only with the gaining of seniority can one effectively plan to make use of free ticket privileges.

THE RULES VARY

The time needed for such seniority varies drastically from one airline to another, as some are more liberal than others in this regard. On a recent flight aboard United Airlines, a travel-happy flight attendant said that she was able within only a year of starting her employment to schedule two periods of five consecutive days each month for leisure time (in addition to other scattered days), and was thus able to plan a series of rather ambitious off- duty trips. A fellow flight attendant told of other patterns that could result, even for a junior employee, in at least one bloc of seven consecutive leisure days for travel each month.

While, admittedly, this was under the policy of an unusually generous airline, it is illustrative of the ability of flight attendants to escape the Monday-through-Friday, 9-to-5 routines of most desk jobs, which is of course the major lure of the flight attendant position.